Method and apparatus of tracking time worked in a multi-tasking environment

ABSTRACT

A method and apparatus of maintaining time information for a multi-tasking customer service agent is disclosed. One example method of operation may include maintaining time information allocated to a plurality of tasks. The method may include receiving a first task and starting a first timer at a computing device corresponding to the beginning of work performed on the first task. The method may also include receiving a second task and starting a second timer different from the first timer, which corresponds to the beginning of work performed on the second task. The method may further include transferring a total time allocation record representing a total time counted by the first timer and a total time counted by the second timer to a data record stored in memory, wherein the data record associates the total time counted by the first timer with a corresponding task, and associates the total time counted by the second timer with a different corresponding task.

TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION

This invention relates to a method and apparatus of providing a timetracking interface to a worker who performs multiple tasks in successionand/or simultaneously, and, more specifically, to an application thatoffers tools and options for agents to keep records of time spent oneach task performed.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

In the evolving technology world today, various computer-basedinformation technology (IT) applications, advanced technology devices,and new technology products require constant technical support. Both athome and in the workplace, the need for competent, available andprofessional support services continues to grow as products and servicescontinue to evolve with new and improved technology.

Most technical support services include a live agent who talks directlywith a customer over the telephone or through a live online chatsession. Other examples include automated recordings which can providebasic information and can reduce the amount of time spent between acustomer and a live agent. Speaking directly with a live agent isexpensive and can create financial burdens for corporations.

One way to reduce the costs and increase the efficiency associated withtechnical support, may be to offer the agent various interface tools toprovide options for the agent to talk with more than one person at atime. The agent may also be assigned to complete more than one task at atime (multi-tasking), and answer more than one inquiry at a time. Thetypical agent has a headset microphone and speaker combination to allowthe agent's hands to be free.

Other tools offered to agents would include a personal computer or othercomputing device that could be used to access customer records, accountinformation, technical manuals, and provide a portal to communicate withonline customers. The computer may also provide a medium for the agentto keep copious records of customer interactions for future referenceand for internal management purposes.

Managers and business leaders must keep track of a customer supportagent's time allocated to helping customers so that the agent'sproductivity can be observed for optimized work management procedures.One variable that may provide accurate productivity records may be atimeline or a record of the time spent on each task and/or with eachcustomer. As agents become increasingly busy, the amount of time spentassisting customers may be increasingly difficult to track and record.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

One embodiment of the present invention may include a method ofmaintaining time information allocated to a plurality of tasks. Themethod may include receiving a first task and starting a first timer ata computing device corresponding to the beginning of work performed onthe first task. The method may also include receiving a second task andstarting a second timer different from the first timer, whichcorresponds to the beginning of work performed on the second task. Themethod may further include transferring a total time allocation recordrepresenting a total time counted by the first timer and a total timecounted by the second timer to a data record stored in memory, whereinthe data record associates the total time counted by the first timerwith a corresponding task, and associates the total time counted by thesecond timer with a different corresponding task.

Another example embodiment of the present invention may include anapparatus configured to maintain time information allocated to aplurality of tasks. The apparatus may include a receiver configured toreceive a first task and a second task. The apparatus may also include aprocessor configured to start a first timer corresponding to thebeginning of work performed on the first task, and configured to start asecond timer different from the first timer, which corresponds to thebeginning of work performed on the second task. The apparatus mayfurther include a transmitter configured to transfer a total timeallocation record representing a total time counted by the first timerand a total time counted by the second timer to a data record stored inmemory, wherein the data record associates the total time counted by thefirst timer with a corresponding task, and associates the total timecounted by the second timer with a different corresponding task.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 illustrates an example network configuration, according toexample embodiments of the present invention.

FIG. 2 illustrates an example agent interface, according to exampleembodiments of the present invention.

FIG. 3 illustrates an example timeline toolbar interface application,according to example embodiments of the present invention.

FIG. 4 illustrates an example new timer interface application, accordingto example embodiments of the present invention.

FIG. 5 illustrates another example timer interface application,according to example embodiments of the present invention.

FIG. 6 illustrates an example method flow diagram, according to exampleembodiments of the present invention.

FIG. 7 illustrates an example network entity configured to store andexecute any of the example applications described in the specification,according to example embodiments of the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

It will be readily understood that the components of the presentinvention, as generally described and illustrated in the figures herein,may be arranged and designed in a wide variety of differentconfigurations. Thus, the following detailed description of theembodiments of a method, apparatus, and system, as represented in theattached figures, is not intended to limit the scope of the invention asclaimed, but is merely representative of selected embodiments of theinvention.

The features, structures, or characteristics of the invention describedthroughout this specification may be combined in any suitable manner inone or more embodiments. For example, the usage of the phrases “exampleembodiments”, “some embodiments”, or other similar language, throughoutthis specification refers to the fact that a particular feature,structure, or characteristic described in connection with the embodimentmay be included in at least one embodiment of the present invention.Thus, appearances of the phrases “example embodiments”, “in someembodiments”, “in other embodiments”, or other similar language,throughout this specification do not necessarily all refer to the samegroup of embodiments, and the described features, structures, orcharacteristics may be combined in any suitable manner in one or moreembodiments.

In addition, while the term “message” has been used in the descriptionof embodiments of the present invention, the invention may be applied tomany types of network data, such as packet, frame, datagram, etc. Forpurposes of this invention, the term “message” also includes packet,frame, datagram, and any equivalents thereof. Furthermore, while certaintypes of messages and signaling are depicted in exemplary embodiments ofthe invention, the invention is not limited to a certain type ofmessage, and the invention is not limited to a certain type ofsignaling.

FIG. 1 illustrates an example communication network, according toexample embodiments of the present invention. Referring to FIG. 1, alive agent 101 is situated in a working environment with a hands-freeheadset that provides flexibility to answer calls and work on a computerdevice. The live agent 101 is positioned near a computer display 102which is coupled to a desktop or laptop computer 103. Alternatively, thedesktop computer 103 may be a handheld computer with an integrateddisplay.

A network 104 provides a backbone for short messaging service messages(SMS), email messages, digital voice calls, PSTN phone calls etc. Thenetwork 104 may include a local loop subscriber line, public switchedtelephone network (PSTN), a digital data network providing voice overInternet protocol (VoIP) and/or Internet access. Customers 106A and 106Brepresent two different customers which may be calling a service centerto report a problem with their service or product (e.g., cable,Internet, computer support, software, hardware device troubleshooting,etc.).

In operation, a first user 106A may call the customer service departmentemploying live agent 101. The user may be eventually connected directlyto the live agent 101 via his or her telephone and/or through theagent's computer 103 or telephone. While assisting the first customer106A, the agent 101 must maintain records of his or her time allocatedto the customers to properly acknowledge the tasks performed throughoutthe day.

This time related task information may be used to provide feedback tothe agent 101 from management, and may also provide offer promotions andadvancements in career opportunities, and, may be used for internalbilling procedures to bill the proper clients for time spent on certaintasks. Live agent data centers are commonly outsourced to remotecountries. The agents may provide support for multiple differentcorporations and thus need to keep accurate records of their time spenton each task to ensure adequate business records.

Once the customer 106A is connected with the live agent 101, a timermust be started to keep track of the time spent on the present task.During the connection between the customer 106A and the live agent 101,another customer 106B may be connected to the live agent 101simultaneously, or, the customer call may be placed in a queue operatedby a database server 105. The live agent 101 may receive anacknowledgment of the second customer 106B via his or her phone systemor through the display interface 102. The live agent 101 may be waitingfor information to assist the first customer 106A, or, may be finishedtalking with the first customer 106A, and may decide to accept the callfrom customer 106B even though the agent 101 is still performing work onthe first task.

The live agent 101 must keep track of his or her time spent with eachcustomer, writing down the time and keeping records of the starting andstopping of time spent with customers can be arduous and subject tohuman error. FIG. 2 illustrates an example graphical user interface(GUI) according to example embodiments of the present invention.Referring to FIG. 2, the display 201 provides the live agent 101 with aview of a customer time tracking application 202. The interface mayinclude a unique set of customer colors for example a set of customers#1-#5 is presented at section 202-1. The customer numbers may beselected in the order that they are presented to the live agent 101 orat the live agent's discretion. A toolbar 202-3 may provide a timeselection feature that corresponds to the time spent with each customer.The live agent 101 may start a particular timer (#1-#5) by pressing playor start on the colored button corresponding to the customer presentlybeing assisted.

FIG. 3 illustrates a timer toolbar application, according to exampleembodiments of the present invention. Referring to FIG. 3, the multipletimers 303-308 may be started and stopped at any time corresponding tothe live agent's present customer and/or task. The timers 303-308 may becreated, started, stopped, and/or closed at any time. Creating a newtimer may be performed with a single click of a button. The time spenton a particular task may be tracked and associated with a project, suchas, a particular contract, billing procedure, task name and/or account.The task may be instantly associated with the project by selecting theproject when the timer is first created/initiated. The association ofthe data may be performed at a later time and stored in a remotedatabase.

In operation, the live agent 101 may initiate a timer for a firstcustomer related task. When the agent 101 encounters another task orcustomer, the timer may be instantly paused on the first task manuallyby the agent's actions or automatically by the agent selecting a secondtimer for the second customer. Alternatively, if the agent is handlingboth tasks simultaneously, both timers may be active at the same time. Athird task may create a predetermined task pausing operation that forcesthe first task to be paused since the agent's may not be permitted toperform three simultaneous tasks depending on the limitations imposed bythe management.

FIG. 3 illustrates various different timers 303-308, according toexample embodiments of the present invention. The presently selectedtimer may include time information 309 to indicate the amount of timespent on all of the pending tasks. A project name may be included toindicate the name of the project 315. A color window may be used to showthe present timer and task being performed in window 316. A clock timermay be used to resume a present timer 301 and a pause timer 302 may beused to pause the present task. Additional features, such as, play 310,add 311, refresh 312 and remove 313 may provide easy shortcuts to createnew timers and manipulate their operations. Another timer 314 mayindicate the amount of time spent on a current task.

FIG. 4 illustrates a screenshot of a new timer setup interface,according to example embodiments of the present invention. A new timermenu heading is displayed in the new window 401. The new timer windowmay be loaded by a single button selection operation of the menu itemsin toolbar 300. A timer color 402 is offered for selection by the agent101. The color displayed may be a new color not currently being usedand/or the color may be modified per the agent's discretion. A “Hint”menu 403 may be offered to provide the agent with an opportunity tocreate a shortcut or data menu used to identify the task or customerassociated with the new color. A “start at save” feature 404 may beselected by the agent to create an automatic save feature that savesinformation periodically once the timer is started. A separate workinformation button 405 may be used to view additional informationrelated to the task. Finally, the new timer may be saved at menu option406, or, saved and a new timer menu may be presented at menu option 407or the operation may be cancelled by selecting menu option 408.

FIG. 5 illustrates another example user interface, according to exampleembodiments of the present invention. Referring to FIG. 5, a time framethat includes multiple days may be accessed and viewed by the agent 101.A period of days represented by menu item 501 may be modified or viewedby selecting a drop down menu. The amount of time worked on a particularproject for the stated period of time may be viewed at menu item 502.The type of work may be selected to correspond to the type of work beingperformed, such as, “project tasks” associated with specific projects atmenu item 503. Predetermined projects may include tasks that areassigned to the agent 101 and the time spent on those tasks may bedesignated by selecting “project tasks” to identify the work performed.

FIG. 5 further illustrates other options, such as, project name 504,which may include a drop down menu to select any of the presentlyassigned agent projects which should be associated with the time worked.Another option may include viewing all tasks or just the tasks assignedto the agent at menu item 505. Notes may be made to correspond to theprojects and time spent at menu option 506. The specific activityperformed by the agent may also be designated for the time spent by theagent, such as, coding, support, Q&A, sales, etc., at menu option 507.The timesheet information generated may be sent to a central repositoryremote server where the agent's work efforts are linked to activityrecords for management record keeping.

FIG. 6 illustrates an example method according to example embodiments ofthe present invention. Referring to FIG. 6, an agent 101 may beginworking on a first task by selecting a specific color timer button todesignate the first task and the time associated with the first task, atoperation 601. According to one example, the agent 101 may receive acall initiating a second task and select a second color to start a timerfor the second task on his or her user interface at operation 602. Asthe phone call for the second task expires, the first task may bere-selected to restart the first timer which was automatically pausedwhen the second task was initiated, at operation 603. Alternatively,both clocks may be running simultaneously depending on the agent'spresent working condition and preference.

Next, an email may be received which requires an immediate response,receiving the email may automatically initiate a third task and acorresponding third timer to begin counting automatically, at operation604. This third timer may be counting simultaneously with the secondand/or third timer, may pause one and not the other timer, or, may pauseboth the first and second timers. Lastly, the third task may becompleted and the task time may be committed to memory. The timer may beclosed and the first color may be automatically re-started to resume thefirst task, at operation 605.

The operations of a method or algorithm described in connection with theembodiments disclosed herein may be embodied directly in hardware, in acomputer program executed by a processor, or in a combination of thetwo. A computer program may be embodied on a computer readable medium,such as a storage medium. For example, a computer program may reside inrandom access memory (“RAM”), flash memory, read-only memory (“ROM”),erasable programmable read-only memory (“EPROM”), electrically erasableprogrammable read-only memory (“EEPROM”), registers, hard disk, aremovable disk, a compact disk read-only memory (“CD-ROM”), or any otherform of storage medium known in the art.

An exemplary storage medium may be coupled to the processor such thatthe processor may read information from, and write information to, thestorage medium. In the alternative, the storage medium may be integralto the processor. The processor and the storage medium may reside in anapplication specific integrated circuit (“ASIC”). In the alternative,the processor and the storage medium may reside as discrete components.For example FIG. 7 illustrates an example network element 700, which mayrepresent any of the above-described network components 102, 103, 104and 105.

As illustrated in FIG. 7, a memory 710 and a processor 720 may bediscrete components of the network entity 700 that are used to executean application or set of operations. The application may be coded insoftware in a computer language understood by the processor 720, andstored in a computer readable medium, such as, the memory 710. Thecomputer readable medium may be a non-transitory computer readablemedium that includes tangible hardware components in addition tosoftware stored in memory. Furthermore, a software module 730 may beanother discrete entity that is part of the network entity 700, andwhich contains software instructions that may be executed by theprocessor 720. In addition to the above noted components of the networkentity 700, the network entity 700 may also have a transmitter andreceiver pair configured to receive and transmit communication signals(not shown).

While preferred embodiments of the present invention have beendescribed, it is to be understood that the embodiments described areillustrative only and the scope of the invention is to be defined solelyby the appended claims when considered with a full range of equivalentsand modifications (e.g., protocols, hardware devices, software platformsetc.) thereto.

1. A method of maintaining time information allocated to a plurality oftasks, the method comprising: receiving a first task and starting afirst timer at a computing device corresponding to the beginning of workperformed on the first task; receiving a second task and starting asecond timer different from the first timer, which corresponds to thebeginning of work performed on the second task; and transferring a totaltime allocation record representing a total time counted by the firsttimer and a total time counted by the second timer to a data recordstored in memory, wherein the data record associates the total timecounted by the first timer with a corresponding task, and associates thetotal time counted by the second timer with a different correspondingtask.
 2. The method of claim 1, further comprising: operating both thefirst timer and the second timer simultaneously and automatically endingthe first timer when the first task is completed and automaticallyending the second timer when the second task is completed.
 3. The methodof claim 2, wherein starting the second timer automatically initiates atleast one of ending the first timer and pausing the first timer.
 4. Themethod of claim 1, further comprising: receiving a third task andstarting a third timer that is different from the first timer and thesecond timer, the third timer corresponding to the beginning of workperformed on the third task.
 5. The method of claim 4, furthercomprising: assigning the first task a first color indicator; assigningthe second task a second color indicator different from the first colorindicator; and assigning the third task a third color indicatordifferent from the first color indicator and the second color indicator.6. The method of claim 4, wherein the first task, the second task andthe third task are received as at least one of a phone call, an email,and a text message.
 7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:pausing the first timer when the second task is received and resumingthe first timer when the second task is completed.
 8. An apparatusconfigured to maintain time information allocated to a plurality oftasks, the apparatus comprising: a receiver configured to receive afirst task and a second task; a processor configured to start a firsttimer corresponding to the beginning of work performed on the firsttask, and configured to start a second timer different from the firsttimer, which corresponds to the beginning of work performed on thesecond task; and a transmitter configured to transfer a total timeallocation record representing a total time counted by the first timerand a total time counted by the second timer to a data record stored inmemory, wherein the data record associates the total time counted by thefirst timer with a corresponding task, and associates the total timecounted by the second timer with a different corresponding task.
 9. Theapparatus of claim 8, wherein the first timer and the second timer areoperated simultaneously, and the first timer is automatically ended whenthe first task is completed and the second timer is automatically endedwhen the second task is completed.
 10. The apparatus of claim 9, whereinstarting the second timer automatically initiates at least one of endingthe first timer and pausing the first timer.
 11. The apparatus of claim8, wherein a third task is received and a third timer is started that isdifferent from the first timer and the second timer, the third timercorresponding to the beginning of work performed on the third task. 12.The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the first task is assigned a firstcolor indicator, the second task is assigned a second color indicatordifferent from the first color indicator, and the third task is assigneda third color indicator different from the first color indicator and thesecond color indicator.
 13. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the firsttask, the second task and the third task are received as at least one ofa phone call, an email, and a text message.
 14. The apparatus of claim8, wherein the first timer is paused when the second task is receivedand the first timer is resumed when the second task is completed.
 15. Anon-transitory computer readable storage medium comprising instructionsthat when executed cause a processor perform maintaining timeinformation allocated to a plurality of tasks, the processor beingfurther configured to perform: receiving a first task and starting afirst timer at a computing device corresponding to the beginning of workperformed on the first task; receiving a second task and starting asecond timer different from the first timer, which corresponds to thebeginning of work performed on the second task; and transferring a totaltime allocation record representing a total time counted by the firsttimer and a total time counted by the second timer to a data recordstored in memory, wherein the data record associates the total timecounted by the first timer with a corresponding task, and associates thetotal time counted by the second timer with a different correspondingtask.
 16. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 15,wherein the processor is further configured to perform: operating boththe first timer and the second timer simultaneously and automaticallyending the first timer when the first task is completed andautomatically ending the second timer when the second task is completed.17. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 16, whereinstarting the second timer automatically initiates at least one of endingthe first timer and pausing the first timer.
 18. The non-transitorycomputer readable medium of claim 15, wherein the processor is furtherconfigured to perform: receiving a third task and starting a third timerthat is different from the first timer and the second timer, the thirdtimer corresponding to the beginning of work performed on the thirdtask.
 19. The non-transitory computer readable medium of claim 18,wherein the processor is further configured to perform: assigning thefirst task a first color indicator; assigning the second task a secondcolor indicator different from the first color indicator; and assigningthe third task a third color indicator different from the first colorindicator and the second color indicator.
 20. The non-transitorycomputer readable medium of claim 18, wherein the first task, the secondtask and the third task are received as at least one of a phone call, anemail, and a text message.